The invention relates to an all-steel mounting device for producing an all-steel card clothing for a carding drum or a carding element of a carding machine.
In textile technology, a carding machine or carder (briefly: card or teasel) is used to separate, order, for example to render homogeneous and/or parallel, fibers or fiber material such as, for example, wool, cotton or the like. The product of a carding process is a fibrous web. This fibrous web consist of a loose assembly of ordered individual fibers that can be used to create a non-woven or formed fabric. The fibrous web is obtained in that the fibers are removed with the use of removing means from a large carding drum also referred to as a tambour, and then combined.
In most cases, the carding machine comprises a number of different carding drums or rollers, each being provided with outward-pointing sharp barbs or teeth. Depending on the purpose of use, the number of sharp tips per unit area varies. Likewise, the form and alignment of the tips may vary.
At least one of the mentioned carding drums, for example the tambour, is provided with an all-steel card clothing. Said card clothing consists of a profile wire having a sawtooth profile that has been wound, under tension, onto the carding drum. The profile wire has a foot and a blade. For example, the foot has a rectangular cross-section with two flanks that are parallel to each other and has a back abutting against the surface of the cylindrical carding drum. On the radially outer side, the blade is provided with a sawtooth profile, for example. The profile wire that is arranged overall on a helical line is preferably subject to longitudinal tension. Its ends are securely attached to the drum, for example, by soldering, welding or in another manner.
One requirement for card clothings, in particular as relates to all-steel card clothings, is the longest possible useful life. In addition, it is endeavored that the profile wire installed on the carding drum, the all-steel clothing, can be subsequently re-sharpened. Other requirements for all-steel card clothing are minimal damage to the fibers and optimal fiber resolution, optimal homogenization and/or optimal parallel alignment of the fibers at the time of the production of the fiber fleece.
For mounting all-steel clothing, mounting devices are used. For example, such a mounting device has been known from document EP 1 399 901 B1. The carding drum that is provided with a profile wire is set in a rack and is driven in a prespecified direction of rotation. In doing so, a profile wire is supplied in a controlled manner so that the profile wire is wound on the carding drum at a defined tension. The start and the end of the profile wire are affixed to the carding drum by soldering. In addition, it may be necessary to weld the ends of the profile wires to each other in a blunt manner, for example, when a carding drum requires more profile wire than is held by a feed spool.
Documents DE 10 2004 004 433 A1 and DE 10 2004 055 310 A1 disclose a rotational speed controller and control device, for example a measuring device for mounting profile wires on carding drums in carding machines, without removing the affected carding drums from the carding machine.
Fundamentally, a mounting device comprises each a braking and a guide arrangement that guides the profile wire pulled off a feed spool and creates the required bias. The braking and guide arrangement is frequently designed as a carriage that can be slid in longitudinal direction of the carding drum.
Usually, the profile wire is arranged so as to lie on the feed spool, whereby the individual layers are separated by anti-corrosive paper. In doing so, the expression “lying arrangement” is understood to mean that the profile wire is arranged so as to lie flat on one of its flanks. Thus, the teeth of the profile wire essentially point in axial direction of the feed spool. When mounting the profile wire, the profile wire is rotated about 90 degrees about its longitudinal axis, so that said wire can be wound upright onto the carding drum and the sawtooth profile points approximately in radial direction.
One great challenge when mounting a profile wire to produce an all-steel card clothing is to prevent the all-steel card clothing from tilting or tipping over on the already loaded portion of the carding drum. As a rule, the mounted profile wire tends to tip the all-steel card clothing in the direction in which the drum has already been wound with profile wire. Under certain process conditions, the profile wire will also tip in the direction of the carding drum that has not yet been loaded with wire.
In order to obtain a homogenized fiber fleece it is absolutely necessary that the surface of a carding drum be uniformly fitted with a profile wire. The center plane or the alignment plane of a profile wire that has been optimally mounted on a carding roller is perpendicular to a plane that extends through the longitudinal axis of the carding drum. Carding drums, sections thereof or regions on their surface that have been damaged or are fitted with tilted profile wire cannot be used. Therefore, it is necessary that any tilted profile wire on the carding drum be unwound again. Inasmuch as the mounting operation of a profile wire on a carding drum represents a highly complex process that is influenced by the adjustment of many parameters of the mounting device, a tilted profile wire is discarded, as a rule, because the profile wire is plastically deformed during the mounting operation. This deformation, in turn, affects the mounting parameters in such a manner that a mounting process that is both safe and economical is possible only under more difficult conditions. Consequently, a once tilted profile wire is unwound and discarded.
It is the object of the invention to provide an all-steel card clothing that, in a simple manner, allows mounting of a profile wire in order to produce an all-steel wire clothing with high quality and high process safety.